" In Cabo Silleiro stands one of the most spectacular lighthouses in Galicia. Built in 1866, the current building dates from 1924. Located 85 meters high, it offers incredible views over the Atlantic and the Cíes Islands. Its powerful 3,000-watt light can be seen from forty miles away. And now it aspires to become a unique tourist accommodation, with the works carried out by the Vigo Port Authority to transform it into a unique hotel.
The Cape Silleiro lighthouse, at the southern entrance to the Vigo estuary, was one of the emblems of the renewal of the Galician coastal landmarks that took place in the mid-19th century. Since the Tower of Hercules, which they say was built in the 1st century under the Emperor Augustus, no lighthouses had been built on the Galician coast. Nineteen centuries later, at the bottom of the Vigo estuary stood the first of modernity. In April 1944 the old A Guía lighthouse was inaugurated, to guide traffic to the San Simón lazaretto, which had been inaugurated in 1838. That first light used an oil lamp, which was later replaced by oil. In 1914, it would be replaced by the current construction that later incorporated electricity.
Silleiro's came in a second wave. Before, in 1853, the Finisterre and the Cíes Islands were inaugurated. The latter, due to the lack of electricity supply, used an acetylene flasher from 1939 until well into the 20th century.
Shortly after, in 1866, the third delivery of Galician lighthouses arrived in Silleiro. It was built in the parish of Baredo, on the Baiona coast, with a wick lamp that used vegetable oil as fuel until, already in 1909, oil was incorporated.
The current building dates from 1924. On August 8 of that year, the grand inauguration of a «building of recent construction, equipped with all the comforts, and a first-rate lighthouse with an oblique lantern is celebrated, being the first of this system installed in Spain and of national construction ”, explains El Pueblo Gallego in his chronicle. "It has a basement with a mercury float and the apparatus is made up of six catadrioptic lenses," which produce "lightning flashes" every fifteen seconds. The chronicler affirms that his oil burner generates an intensity "of thirty thousand spark plugs", with a range of 33 miles.
A few months later, in December 1924, a fire broke out. While the lighthouse keepers Antonio Bruno and Ildenfonso Ruiz lit the lighthouse, "a lamp detached from a nail" exploded and the flames reached the compressed air and oil tanks. The keepers, helped by the daughters of the first (the whole family lived in the lighthouse), "with unequaled courage they managed to put out the fire", although they all suffered various burns.
For a time, the auxiliary lighthouse had to work, while El Pueblo Gallego requested the installation of a telephone "that would give such great benefits to those families far from this village."
The lighthouse was electrified in 1960, when a 3,000 watt lamp was installed, with a range of up to forty miles in clear weather. Previously, it had been equipped with a siren for foggy days and a radio transmitter with a range of up to two hundred nautical miles.
Now, the Vigo Port Authority is refurbishing the Silleiro lighthouse to accommodate tourists. The nine-ton dome was removed, restored and relocated at the end of 2019. And, from the heights of the edge of the Vigo estuary, your guests will be able to remember Verne, who visited this estuary twice, and feel like at the lighthouse at the end of the world."
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